Examples
Worked examples
- Is an instance
A model card declaring 'Weights: Llama 3 Community Licence (with named use restrictions); Code: Apache-2.0; Training data: undisclosed proprietary mix'.
- Is an instance
An Apache-2.0-licensed open-weights model from Mistral.
Counter-examples
Looks similar, but isn't
- Not an instance
A general statement 'this model is open' without a named licence.
- Not an instance
A licence on the model card README that conflicts with the weights file licence.
Editorial commentary
Model-weight licences range from permissive open (Apache-2.0, MIT) through copyleft (CC-BY-SA-equivalents are uncommon for weights) to bespoke responsible-AI licences (e.g., Llama Community Licence, OpenRAIL, BigScience RAIL) that impose use restrictions. The licence on weights is legally distinct from a software open-source licence and from training-data licensing constraints.
References
- RAIL Licenses initiative (responsibleailicenses.org); Meta Llama Community Licence; Open Source Initiative AI definitions work.
Also known as
weights licence · model licence
Machine-readable encodings
Use in your systems
<role vocab="credit"
vocab-identifier="https://casrai.org/dictionary/"
vocab-term="Model weight licence"
vocab-term-identifier="https://casrai.org/dictionary/term/model-weight-licence" />{
"@context": "https://schema.org",
"@type": "DefinedTerm",
"name": "Model weight licence",
"identifier": "https://casrai.org/dictionary/term/model-weight-licence",
"description": "The licence terms governing the use, modification, and redistribution of a model's trained weights, which may differ from the licence on the training code and the licence on the training data.",
"inDefinedTermSet": "https://casrai.org/dictionary/domain/ai-and-ml-research-outputs/",
"url": "https://casrai.org/dictionary/term/model-weight-licence",
"sameAs": [
"weights licence",
"model licence"
],
"license": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/"
}
